Will Congress Ban Municipal WiFi?
The recently introduced U.S. Senate bill, called the Broadband Investment and Consumer Choice Act of 2005, may spell the end for municipal wireless. Among other things, the bill says that when there is a case of competing bids between a private company and local government, preference will be given to the private company. Richard Koman reports on the implications of this bill and what it could mean for consumers long-term.
[Policy DevCenter]

An Interview with Ourmedia.org's J.D. Lasica
The volume of people who are now documenting their lives with digital video, audio, and photography, and sharing them on public media sites like Ourmedia.org is yet another example of the exploding grassroots media movement. Richard Koman interviews J.D. Lasica, cofounder of Ourmedia.org, on what's actually on Ourmedia, how it came to be, how it works, and what it portents for the future of videocasting.
[Policy DevCenter]

Grokking Grokster
On June 27, 2005 the Supreme Court vacated the decision of the Ninth Circuit Court, and remanded the case of MGM v. Grokster back to them. This they did unanimously, based on the opinion that the Ninth Circuit had misinterpreted the Universal Studios v. Sony "Betamax" decision of 1983. Quinn Norton offers some analysis of the Grokster decision, looks at what companies may be next in line for litigation, and whether or not the decision did much to answer the great outstanding questions of copyright in the digital age.
[Policy DevCenter]

How to Build a Nonprofit for Your Community
As the open source movement matures, the organizations that support it are growing up, too. Many open source projects have already created nonprofit organizations that support their communities, while other projects are considering ways to establish nonprofits. David Boswell details how mozdev.org built a nonprofit organization and shows you how to do the same for your community. He covers fundraising, obtaining legal advice, staffing, and more.
[Policy DevCenter]

Some Rights Reserved
With unprecedented institutional backing and a grassroots creative scene willing to take up the challenge, the future looks bright for Creative Commons in the U.K. Becky Hogge reports on the state of the Creative Commons project across the pond.
[O'Reilly Network]

Software Patents in the EU
Ed Griffith-Jones and Tom Chance describe the state of software patents in the European Union and argue that software patents do not lead to increased productivity and do not benefit society. In short, they think that software patents are a bad idea. What do you think? Weigh in with your opinions via the Talkback at the end of the article.
[Policy DevCenter]

Protect Your OSP with logfinder
Do you keep all your logs? Get ready for trouble. The EFF has issued a warning to online service providers, including ISPs, web site publishers, and bloggers, to start deleting their log files ASAP. To help, the EFF has created a free tool called logfinder that makes it easier to find and delete those log files.
[Policy DevCenter]

Ernest Miller on What's Wrong with the Induce Act
U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch has sponsored a bill before Congress, called the Induce Act, which would leave people who haven't directly infringed copyright, but who provide tools or support for people who do infringe copyright, to be open to lawsuits for the infringement. Richard Koman sits down with Ernest Miller to discuss what's wrong with the Induce Act and its potentially debilitating impact on technological innovation. The two also discuss a number of technologies that will never get off the ground if Induce is passed.
[Policy DevCenter]

Collecting E-Commerce Taxes Door-to-Door
For about a decade, web stores have been exempt from collecting local sales and use taxes for deliveries outside their local jurisdictions. For most web stores, especially those based in sparsely populated states, this amounts to de facto tax-free status when shipping to most of the country. While online stores get a free pass from many taxes, storefront operations are universally expected to collect local taxes at the point of sale. This article discusses one possible solution to the e-commerce taxation problem: simply requiring couriers to collect local taxes at the point of delivery.
[Policy DevCenter]

Free the Orphans: A Look at the Case of Kahle v. Ashcroft
Richard Koman examines the suit in Kahle v. Ashcroft, brought by two digital archivists intending to free in-copyright, out-of-print media, known as "orphan works," from oblivion. Richard talks with lead attorney for the case, Chris Sprigman, where he discusses how this case takes an entirely different angle from the recent copyright term extension suit, Eldred.
[Policy DevCenter]

Opening Up E-Voting
The politics of e-voting may be controversial, but the technologies used are not exceptionally complicated or difficult to understand. Now, two initiatives have opened e-voting systems to public examination and varying degrees of tranparency and verification.
[Policy DevCenter]

VoIP Regulation in America: A View from the Trenches
VoIP is undergoing incredible growth right now, and in the next year there will likely be dozens of firms offering what only a few offer today, as far as VoIP-to-PSTN delivery. The regulatory environment is stable at the moment, but far from certain. In this op-ed piece, John Todd discusses why he believes regulatory stances need to be established now, while the industry is still small, and why old ideas of technology need to be removed from regulatory wording. Weigh in with your thoughts at the end of the article.
[ Policy DevCenter]

Internet PerspectivesSpam Busters
Spam has become a $10 billion problem for American businesses, and liability concerns could push that amount even higher. To help enterprise recipients fight back the rising tide, ActiveState convened a task force of open source spam fighters to address the problem.
[O'Reilly Network]